Bulgaria has strong medal hopefuls at the Paris Olympics

The Bulgarians achieved five quotas for the Paris Olympics in boxing which is their best performance since the Athens 2004 edition.

The Bulgarian boxers joined to the Olympic movement still in 1952 but their best ages were mostly in the 1970s, 1980s and the 1990s. The country earned five gold medals, five silvers and nine bronzes in the Olympic boxing history and the Bulgarians are currently No.13 in the overall medal table.

The Bulgarians impressed in the smallest weight categories during the Olympic history, two of their titles were achieved at the light flyweight and the further two at the flyweight. Georgi Kostadinov was their first Olympic Champion in boxing in 1972, while Petar Lesov continued their winning path at the flyweight in 1980.

Ivailo Marinov defeated all of his rivals in the Seoul 1988 Olympic Games but their biggest star was Daniel Petrov who celebrated his gold medal in 1996. Their fifth Olympic title was achieved by a fantastic female boxer, Stoyka Petrova Krasteva in the Tokyo 2021 Games which was a start of a new era in their boxing life.

The Bulgarian boxers amazed in the European Games more than one year ago when Stanimira Petrova, Svetlana Kamenova and Javier Ibanez all achieved their Olympic spots in the first opportunity to qualify for Paris.

Stanimira Petrova was World Champion in 2014 and since then she won all of the major championships, tournaments but the Olympic medal is still missing of her.

Their next brilliant female boxer, Svetlana Kamenova was inspired by Stoyka Krasteva and she returned from her coaching job in 2021 to achieve a top result in the Paris Olympics.

Radoslav Rosenov is an outstanding boxer and he won several editions of the European Boxing Championships as a schoolboy, junior, youth and U22.

Rami Kiwan progressed so strongly in the recent one and half year and the light middleweight (71kg) boxer qualified for the Paris Olympics through Busto Arsizio.